


a mouthful of smoke & a mind full of wishes

by intherainstorm



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Self-Harm, Teenage Rebellion, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-11
Updated: 2016-09-11
Packaged: 2018-08-14 08:39:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8006050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/intherainstorm/pseuds/intherainstorm
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>teenage rebellion, mixed with an existensial crisis, add some vodka and a couple of cigarettes and you will have a bunch of awful life desisions.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a mouthful of smoke & a mind full of wishes

**Author's Note:**

> not beta'd

Chan was pacing around the dorm. The other guys had left him alone, going to see a movie that he was too young to see, because they were really excited for it. Except Jihoon, that one was working hard back in the studio. Or having a breakdown. Sometimes Chan wondered which songs were written during his bad times, but he could kind of guess and he knew better than to ask.

He knew he was young, he knew that he was the only one out of the 13 boys that wasn’t of age yet, but that didn’t mean it was an invitation for the other boys to treat him like a child. Which they did, a lot. 

The only one that didn’t was Jihoon, who didn’t have time for any of that stuff, and Minghao, who was a gentle soul and knew how much it embarassed Chan. Hansol and Seungkwan barely did it either, as they knew how it felt, but as they now were officially adults they also started to baby him quite a bit.

It was incredibly frustrating. Especially when he didn’t at all feel like a baby, he felt like his soul was way too old for his body and that he had lived a thousand lives previous to this one. Whether it was after a schedule, when he was too drained to do anything and just let himself be led back to the dorm. 

Or whether it was on a day off, when the older members arranged different activites. Usually he could be in on them as well, but since Seungkwan and Hansol turned 20 they had started to do a lot more adult-activites. He was kind of fed up with it.

He was so tired of being treated like this. So tired of feeling small and irrelevant, so tired of feeling like he was the disposable one in the group. Chan leant back against the wall, and slid down it a deep sigh. He sat on the ground, knees pressed to his chest and arms wrapped around them. This wasn’t how he wanted to feel. So… empty. He wanted to feel something.

Naturally, being a teenager, he’d for a long time felt an urge to rebell. His entire teens he’d been training, not getting the chance to have a regular childhood in that way. It wasn’t like they lived with their boss, or any other adult that had any authority over them. 

Although honestly, he did. All of the members were elders and the hierarchy made it easy for them to boss him around as they pleased. It was fine, but sometimes he fucking hated it. Rebellion wasn’t easy when you had three 21-year old parents breathing down your neck all the time.

Most teenagers probably felt this kind of… hopelessness. Like there should be more to life, even though he had quite a fullfilling one. Or did they? Ah, the joys of going through an existensial crisis.

Chan slammed his head back against the wall, letting a loud yell escape his mouth. He was so frustrated, and everything was just overwhelming. His right hand tangled in his hair and the other one was in a tight fist, as he banged the floor in frustration. He could feel himself tearing up, and he was trying so hard not to melt down.

His hand flew up to wipe his tears with his long sleeve, he was in nothing but a long knitted sweater and his underwear, and a sob escaped from his throat. Crying definately wasn’t one of his favourite things, and yet he did it so often. Hormones, stress… It just wasn’t as easy as he wanted it to be anymore. 

In his younger days, when he was still a kid, he had such visions about the life as an idol. He thought it would be glamorous, carefree, amazing… 

In reality, it was exhausting. He was exhausted. He was drained, tired, and yet… He was living his dream. He truly was. Performing, creating, it was all he could have ever dreamed of. So even if it was painful, he had to keep at it. 

He pushed himself up, dragging his feet as he walked over to the kitchen. Chan climbed up on the bench, and opened the cupboard just by the ceiling, knowing that there was where Seungcheol and the other elders hid their alcohol. He knew that he would be in so much trouble for this, but he didn’t care. Maybe they would understand, maybe they wouldn’t. Whatever.

Chan looked at the bottles, looking at the alcohol percentage and decided to grab a half empty Absolut Citron, something he knew for sure the older boys used for shots, and hopped down from the bench. Even if he wasn’t allowed to drink, he was often present when the others did. 

Joshua and Soonyoung didn’t drink, so the three of them usually socialized while the others drank or played drinking games. Or mostly him and Soonyoung, as Joshua had his hands full with making sure the other two 95-liners didn’t do anything stupid.

Soonyoung and him were close, being in the performance team together and often getting inspiration from one another, it wasn’t rare that the two of them spent time alone together. 

When it was just the two of them, Soonyoung didn’t treat him like a kid. He talked to him, about regular things. Okay, it wasn’t like all of them constantly treated him like a child. But still, it was so irritating. After a few years it wasn’t strange that he was tired of it.

He moved himself to the window, and dropped down to sit faced towards the glass. As he looked down on the street below, he opened the bottle and took a swig. The liquor burned the back of his throat, but he swallowed the mouthful and sighed deeply. What a life he lived.

Time passed, and an hour or so later he was pretty intoxicated. He had been listening to music on his phone, sipping from the bottle now and then. He wasn’t incredibly drunk, but he was quite lightheaded and everything felt… weird. He didn’t feel like he had the best judgement, right now. 

Despite that, he thought it would be a great idea to dig around in Seungcheol’s jackets. He dragged himself up, swaying a little as he stood, staring at a spot on the wall to focus. This was… new. He’d never been drunk before.

The boy wobbled over to the jackets, rummaging through them to find what he was looking for. In one of Seungcheol’s leather jackets, he found his loot. A pack of cigarettes, and a neon green lighter. Bingo. He fished the items from within the deep pocket, accidentally throwing a receipt to the floor as he pulled his hand out. Nice. Cigarettes.

Chan dragged himself back to his spot by the window, fumbling with the items in his hands. He decided to slide the window open, and moved to sit on the sill. He stared down at the alley below, not much going on. If he looked down the alley, he could spot the quiet road outside their house. 

He took a cigarette out of the pack and put it in between his lips. He took his free hand to grab the lighter. As he tried to light it, his hands were shaking, and it was making it quite hard to keep the flame alive in the cool air seeping in through the window. But he succeeded, and soon he had a mouthful of smoke and a mind full of wishes.

Head tilted back, his eyes slid shut and he let out a cloud of smoke. His hand moved up to his lips, taking another drag from the cigarette. It burned his throat, even more so than the liquor had done, and he let a cough escape. But the burn was satisfying, giving him something to feel, so he took another pull.

He felt so much more in power, breathing out the cloud of smoke out towards the night, the cool air making the skin on his bare legs prickle. His hazed mind made all of his thoughts quiet down, and all of the physical sensations felt dull. Eyes filled with light, he looked out at the pale night sky, illuminated by the light pollution from the crowded city. A feeling of peace rushed through him. This was nice. Destroying himself slowly, buzzing with life. He was hurting so badly, and this was probably not the right wait to dull those feelings.

The cigarette in his hand was almost burnt down to the filter now. Chan looked at it, rolling it between his fingers. In a rash motion, he put it out against his pale thigh. A pained gasp escaped his lips, and he throwed the butt out of the window. It hurt so fucking badly, as a burn wound would, but he just… Every other thought he had in his mind was gone, replaced with focus on that physical pain instead. It felt easier to handle.

It was if as his fingers moved on his own.

He plucked another cigarette from the pack, rinse and repeat.

 

That was how he was found a couple of hours later, when Jihoon stumbled into the dorm after an exhausting day at the studio. He was probably expectiong to come home to a half sleeping Chan in front of the television with some soda, not with a dazed Chan sitting by the window with an almost empty bottle of vodka and the smell of smoke in the air.

He rushed up to the young boy and slapped his cheek lightly, receiving a whine in return, and a slap to the wrist.  
“Chan? Kid? What the fuck do you think you are doing?” The older boy grumbled, shoving the bottle and package of cigarettes aside, petting the younger boy over the head. He had sensed something had been up with the youngest, but he’d never imagined that it would go this far. But honestly, he could handle a drunk teenager that had smoked a couple of cigarettes. It wasn’t like he hadn’t done it before.

He didn’t get anything in return but a groan and suddenly the boy fell and he had a lap full of teenage boy. Chan was wearing nothing but a big sweater (and Jihoon really hoped that he had underwear on) that gave him sweater paws and covered his thighs, down to his knees. Jihoon patted Chan’s thigh to get him off, but as a response he got a wince. The older frowned. Was he in pain?

His hand moved to pull up the sweater, and he stiffened. Several round burn marks covered his pale skin, and Jihoon could feel himself let out a breath that he didn’t know that he had been holding. Fuck. This was really bad. Alcohol and cigarettes, that was bad. But self harm, that was an entire new level of bad. 

He slid his hand into Chan’s hair and caressed him softly, humming a gentle tune with his shaky voice. His free hand slid down to his pocket and pulled out his phone, he had to call Seungcheol now.

_Beep. Beep_

_“Hello?”_

“You gotta come back to the dorm, now.”

_“The movie just ended, we’re heading back now. What’s up, Jihoon?”_

“It’s pretty fucking bad, god, Seungcheol… Can you keep the younger ones out, come up first to help me.”

_“What’s happened? Are you okay?”_ The leader spoke in an anxious voice.

“No but… Chan isn’t.”

A shaky breath was heard from the other line.

_“I’m running home.”_

“Yeah. Hurry.”

Click.

The minutes that passed were the longest in Jihoon’s life so far, or at least it felt like it. He knew that the youngest would be fine, he hadn’t drunk that much and it wasn’t like he was bleeding. But he looked so small in his big shirt, and he was almost passed out from the alcohol and god… Those burns on his leg were hard to look at.

“Jihoon-hyung... I’m spinning…” Chan poked his leg, letting his words escape in a soft whisper. He looked so vunerable. So soft. 

“Take it easy, Chan. You’ll be okay.” Jihoon mumbled out, patting his cheek softly.

Chan shook his head and tilted his head to look out of the window.

“I’m okay now. I can’t… think the thoughts. It’s peaceful... in my head, just a soft cloud,” he spoke, his eyes wandering off to stare out of the window, looking into the dull-lit street. “But I’m not okay.”

Jihoon looked up at the sky. He knew. If anyone knew about not being okay, it was him. For now though, the focus would be on Chan. To clean his wounds, to fix him up. To help him be okay.

Chan gazed out into the night. He felt as if he was far away, floating. He heard the conversation Jihoon had with their leader. He probably was in trouble now. Oh well. If anything, he had an evening of peace. With his mind empty of thoughts, and his eyes full of stars, and his thighs scattered with burns.

**Author's Note:**

> self-indulgent and messy fic focused on baby chan  
> i love chan im sorry for hurting him pls forgive me
> 
> if you have any ideas for fics that u want written then msg me at intherainstorm.tumblr.com 
> 
> school is hell so i don't write as much im sorry ily all
> 
> also i got the inspiration to write this from http://archiveofourown.org/works/7828831/  
> so go chech it out its great and my heart hurts for chan


End file.
